


to be holy

by Anniely



Series: we start four-alarm fires [1]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: AU after Control-Alt-Delete/M.I.A, F/F, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-05
Updated: 2015-02-05
Packaged: 2018-03-10 16:03:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3296357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anniely/pseuds/Anniely
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sociopath wakes up. The reformed killer for hire watches (over?) her. Shouting is not allowed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	to be holy

Shaw opens her eyes with a groan. She tries to sit up, but her body seems to be made from pain instead of flesh.

 

'Ow, fuck. Let me go back to being dead, please,' she grumbles, closing her eyes against the light streaming in through a window.

 

It's quiet in the room, except for the rustle of her blanket as she settles back down. She can hear the cars outside, the ocean-like, slow-moving waves of New York traffic making their criss-cross way through the city.

There's the sound of soft breaths to her left and she doesn't even have to look to know who's sitting there, legs probably pulled up to her chest, her arms around her knees, fitting her long body onto a too-small chair.

 

'Are you asleep?' Sam asks, after a few seconds. She's not one for silence; it's too treacherous. One false move, one wrong step and they know you're there. She prefers noise, loud and honest and hiding everything and nothing at the same time.

 

'No,' comes the simple answer, but nothing else.

 

'When did you become Mrs. One-Word-Answers?'

 

'Finch told me you're recovering, so I'm not allowed to shout at you.'

 

Shaw grins, although it feels like even her face is sore. She has spent a lot of her adult life with voices in her ear, telling her where to go, what to do and who to shoot. There are still voices in her ear, but now they tell her who to keep from getting shot and to be careful. Finch's voice is calm and sometimes, when she aims a bit too high, a little exasperated. John's voice is steady and unwavering.

Root's voice is steel-coated and sharp-edged and Shaw wants to wrap it around herself to see how long she can make it without cutting herself (and even then she would not stop listening, but hold on and hold on and hold on).

 

'Don't give yourself an ulcer,' Shaw says, then gets distracted by dust flakes in the sunlight. _Snowflakes_ , she wants to say, but stops herself just in time. She must be on some very nice drugs.

 

'As long as you don't mind if I fall asleep on you, you're welcome to shout all you want,' she continues.

 

When she looks to the left, she finds Root's face just a few inches from her own, her hair falling into her eyes.

 

Shaw doesn't flinch, thank you very much.

 

Her jokes all get lost somewhere on the way from her brain to her mouth and she is left with nothing to say, staring, only staring. She very much prefers being dead to what she is looking at.

 

'You almost died', Root says, after what feels like a small eternity. It might have been, Shaw wouldn't know. She is counting the time by the flutters of Root's lashes and those of her own heart.

 

'But I didn't, so it's a moot point anyway,' Shaw gives back, aiming for grumpy, but only managing raspy.

 

'If we hadn't found you, Greer _would have killed you_.'

 

'He didn't, but you did, so … '

 

What Shaw really wants to say is _I wouldn't have let him; I knew you would_ _all_ _come_ _for me_ _; Thank you_ , but the words get stuck under her lungs, like flotsam, making it hard to breathe.

 

And Root's still looking at her, pinning her down, making running away impossible (or, maybe, not impossible at all; maybe unnecessary).

 

'I would have burned down the world to find you,' Root says.

 

Shaw wants to laugh, because she believes her.

 

'I don't think Finch would have appreciated _that_ ,' she says instead, scratching at the bandage on her hand. She's pretty much wrapped in gauze; her body might fall apart if someone were to pull at the right place.

 

'Don't joke,' Root says and it sounds like a prayer. _Please_ , _please_ , _please_.

 

Shaw sighs, tired to her raw, broken bones. She sees a golden urn on the table; sees her father in the wreckage of their car; sees Michael on the floor in a pool of his own blood; sees people wearing black standing around Joss' grave; sees Hersh's bullet hit Root; Bear and John and Finch and Fusco. There is a box in her mind, one for every person she has ever cared about. They are labeled, very neatly, and every scrap of feeling goes in there so she won't have to carry it around with her in her pockets.

 

She's looking at Root, who doesn't have just one box, because the first one got filled up too fast. She's got her own little corner full of little boxes in Shaw's mind and Shaw just wants to set fire to the whole thing, watch herself burn and go back to when no one said her name like it is absolution.

 

'We're killers, Root. We don't know how to be happy.'

 

Here comes her own voice; not quite as good with the big words, but just small enough to make it through the cracks, to get in and under.

 

'I'm not asking for happiness, Sameen.'

 

If people could float, Sam would be banging against the ceiling – _bump_ , _bump_ , _bump –_ because she got it all wrong. She didn't know anyone could say her name (like _that_ ) and it would absolve _her_.

 

'You know,' she tries, oh how she tries, 'That I have a personality disorder, right?'

 

'I'm not trying to fix you,' Root says, 'You don't look broken to me.'

 

Just about now, Sam could really use some shouting. Shouting doesn't require an answer, only endurance.

But Root only takes her hand (for some reason Sam lets her) and tugs in a loose corner of gauze. Her hand feels very cold and Root's feels very soft … warm, not soft (both?).

 

Sam lets out a groan, rubbing her free hand across her face. She felt like this when she was four years old and fell off the swings. She had seen other children fall off before and knew it was required to cry. But, as she was lying on the lawn in front of her house, staring up at the blue sky, she couldn't get any tears to fall, no matter how much she willed them to. Back then, Sam decided to get up and back on the swings and leave the crying to someone else.

Now, she decides to do the same, because screw it, she just came back from the dead, but her hand is warm and she doesn't need emotions to _feel_.

 

'What do you want then?' she asks, ever so slightly curling her fingers around Root's.

 

'Talk to you whenever I want,' Root says.

 

'You already do that,' Sam reminds her, 'Whether I want to talk to _you_ or not.'

 

Root smiles, tilting her head, her hair falling away from her face a bit. There are dark smudges under her eyes and Sam wants to wipe them off, but doesn't know how.

 

'True. You're also already my partner in crime.'

 

'Fun times.'

 

'I'd like you to try and not get yourself killed,' Root says, softer, 'Losing the Machine was like losing my purpose. Losing you would be like losing myself.'

 

It's in one of her boxes, a tiny memory: They are standing in her grandmother's home, after her funeral, and her mother is crying. _Why did we have to go if it makes you sad, mom?_ Her mother picking her up and hugging her. _Some things, Sammy, you don't do for yourself, but for others._

 

'Still seven lives left,' Sam says and pulls and Roots lets her, so very trusting, like they couldn't easily break each other's necks twenty different ways.

 

'Don't think this means I won't shout at you later,' Root says, curling up next to her, her breath ghosting over Sam's throat.

 

Sam hums her agreement. Every now and then, she enjoys some good old shouting. She moves her head a bit to make sure she doesn't wake up with a mouth full of hair. Her arm is trapped in a somewhat awkward angle against Root's chest, but she's not going to complain; her whole left side is comfortably warm now.

 

 

Sam drifts off knowing there is still an AI-war raging outside that might cost them all their lives, for good, this time; that seven lives might not be enough; that she still doesn't know what relationships, of any kind, even _are_ , let alone how people have them (she's not even sure she's in one); that her cuts and wounds are probably still going to itch tomorrow.

 

But she's warm and maybe that's matters; and maybe she'll get a steak when she wakes up. Yeah, she's definitely going to ask John for a steak; he won't give her one of those _When you're recovering you need to eat healthy food_ –lectures that Finch is so fond of.

Maybe they'll even let Bear stay with her. There's definitely enough space in this bed for three, Sam thinks, before she falls asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Writing Root is hard, I hope I still did her justice.
> 
> Edit: Alright, I put them back in.


End file.
